All the Devils' hottest news, from notes to numbers to neutral-zone traps

Friday, April 19, 2013

Devils right wing Ilya Kovalchuk is practicing with the team, but appears to be one of the extra forwards on the fifth line with Andrei Loktionov, Krys Barch and Tom Kostopoulos.

Kovalchuk has missed the last 11 games with a right shoulder injury he sustained in a 2-1 victory over Florida on March 23. That he is one of the extra forwards today would seem to indicate that there are no plans for him to play in Saturday afternoon's game against Florida.

The other line combinations remain the same as in Thursday's 3-0 win in Philadelphia, which snapped the Devils' 10-game losing streak.

Devils goaltender Martin Brodeur left practice after about only 15 minutes. He was not accompanied by the medical trainer, so it appears he was just out there to face some shots and get warm after playing Thursday night and with back-to-back games coming up against Florida Saturday and the Rangers Sunday.

Brodeur has started the last 13 games.

Defenseman Anton Volchenkov, who has one more game to serve on his four-game suspension for elbowing Boston's Brad Marchand in the head, is back at practice today after not practicing with the team Wednesday. He is paired today with Alex Urbom on what appears to be the fourth pairing.

About

TOM GULITTI has covered the New Jersey Devils for The Record since 2002. Prior to that, he covered the New York Rangers for four years. Gulitti joined The Record in 1998 after six years at The North Jersey Herald News. He graduated from Binghamton University in 1991 with a Bachelor of Arts in Rhetoric-Literature.